LITMIR.BIZ

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Harding had secreted in his grip, in the smoker ahead. He had read every line in the magazines he had provided himself with, even to the advertisements.

      The time hung heavily, drearily. The train grumbled, and shook, and jolted its ponderous way on across the vast American continent. It was all very tedious.

      Then the endless stream of thought, often fantastic, always unconvincing, always leading up to those ridiculous cyphers representing one hundred thousand dollars. If only they were numerals. Nice, odd numerals. He was a firm believer in the luck of odd numbers. But no. It was always "noughts." Most disgusting "noughts."

      He yawned for about the thousandth time on his two days' journey, and wondered hopelessly how many more times he would yawn before he reached the Pacific.

      Hello! The conductor was coming through again. Going to tear off more ticket, Gordon supposed. That tearing off was most interesting. He wondered if the ticket would last out till he reached Seattle. He supposed so.

      Seattle! The Yukon! The Yukon certainly suggested fortune, the making of a rapid fortune. But how? One hundred thousand dollars! There it was again.

      His eyes were following the movements of the rubicund conductor. The man looked enormously self-satisfied, and was certainly bursting with authority and adipose tissue. He wondered if he couldn't annoy him some way. It would be good to annoy some one. He closed his smiling eyes and feigned sleep.

      The vast bulk of blue uniform and brass buttons bore down upon him. It reached his "pew," dropped into the seat opposite, and tweaked him by the coat sleeve.

      Gordon opened his eyes with a pretended start.

      "Where are we?" he demanded irritably.

      "Som'eres between the devil an' the deep sea, I guess," grinned the man. "Your—ticket."

      Gordon began to fumble slowly through his pockets. He knew precisely where his ticket was, but he searched carefully and deliberately in every other possible place. The man waited, breathing heavily. He displayed not the slightest sign of the annoyance desired. At last Gordon turned out the inside pocket of his coat. The first thing he discovered amongst its contents was his father's private code book, and the annoyance was in his eyes rather than in those of the conductor. His resolve to return it had been entirely forgotten.

      He forthwith produced his ticket.

      "The devil's behind us, I s'pose," said Gordon. "Anyway, we're told it's the right place for him. I'll be glad when we reach the sea."

      The conductor examined the ticket, while Gordon returned the code book to his pocket.

      "Ah, Seattle," the brassbound official murmured. Then he looked into the now smiling face before him. "You ain't for Snake's Fall?"

      "Guess I shouldn't have paid for a ticket to Seattle if I were," Gordon retorted with some sarcasm.

      "That's so," observed the official, quite undisturbed. "I knew one guy was for Seattle. I was kind o' wondering 'bout him. Se-attle," he murmured reflectively.

      "On the coast. A seaport. Puget Sound," said Gordon objectionably.

      "A low down sailor town on the side of a hill, wher' if you ain't climbin' up you're mostly fallin' down. Wher' it rains nigh six months o' the year, an' parboils you the rest. Wher' every bum going to or coming from the Yukon gets thoroughly soused and plays the fool gener'ly."

      The man's retort was as pointedly objectionable as Gordon's had been, and the challenge of it stirred the latter's sense of humor.

      "Guess I'm one of the bums 'going to,'" he said cheerfully. The man's fat-surrounded eyes ceased to grin.

      "Startin' fer the Yukon in—July? Never heard of it," he said, with a shake of the head. "It's as ridiculous as startin' fer hell in summer time. You'll make Alaska when she freezes up, and sit around till she opens next spring. Say——"

      "You mean I'll get hung up for—ten months?" cried Gordon aghast.

      "Jest depends on your business."

      "Yes, of course."

      Gordon's heart sank as the man grunted up from his seat, and handed him back his mutilated ticket. He watched him pass on down the car and finally vanish through the doorway of the parlor-car beyond. Then his eyes came back to his surroundings. He stared at the heads of his fellow travelers dotting the tops of the seats about him. Then his eyes dropped to his grip on the opposite seat lying under his overcoat, and again, later, they turned reflectively towards the window. Ten months. Ten months, and he only had six before him in which to accomplish his purpose. Was there ever a more perfect imbecile? Was there ever such a fool trick?

      A smile of chagrin grew in his eyes as he remembered how he had arrived at the Pennsylvania Depot, and had studied the list of places to which he could go, seeking to find in the names an inspiration for the accomplishment of his purpose. There had been so many that his amazed head had been set whirling. There he had stood, wondering and gawking like some foolish country "Rube," without one single idea beyond the fact that he must go somewhere and make one hundred thousand dollars in six months' time.

      Then had come that one illuminating flash. He saw the name in great capital letters in an advertisement. "The Yukon." Of course. It was the one and only place in the world for quick fortunes, and forthwith he had booked his passage to Seattle.

      Nor was he likely to forget his immense satisfaction when he heard Harding's respectful "Yes, sir," in response to his information. Now he certainly was convinced that he was own brother to the finest bred jackass in the whole wide world. However, there was nothing to be done but go on to Seattle. He had paid for his ticket, and, Providence willing, to Seattle he would go.

      But Providence had its own ideas upon the matter. Furthermore, Providence began at once to set its own machinery working in his behalf. It was the same Providence that looks after drunken men and imbeciles. Half an hour later it impelled him to gather up his traps and pass forward into the smoker, accompanied by one of his own big, expensive cigars.

      He pushed his way into the car through the narrow door of communication. A haze of tobacco smoke blurred his view, but at once he became aware of a single, melancholy, benevolent eye gazing steadily at him.

      It was an amiable eye and withal shrewd. Also it was surrounded by a shaggy dark brow. This had a fellow, too, but the eye belonging to the fellow was concealed beneath what was intended to be a flesh-tinted cover, secured in place by elastic round its owner's head.

      The surrounding face was rugged and weather tanned. And it finished with a mop of iron-gray hair at one end, and an aggressively tufted chin beard at the other. But the thrusting whisker could not disguise the general strength of the face.

      Below this was a spread of large body clad in a store suit of some pretensions, but of ill fit, and a heavy gold watchchain and a large diamond pin in the neckwear suggested opulence. Furthermore, One Eye suggested the prime of middle life, and robust health and satisfaction.

      There was only one other occupant of the car. He was two or three seats away, across the aisle. He promptly claimed Gordon's attention. He was amusing himself by shooting "crap" on a baize-covered traveling-table. Both men were smoking hard, and, by the density of the atmosphere, and the aroma, the newcomer estimated that they, unlike himself, were not five-cent-cigar men.

      He paused at the dice thrower's seat and watched the proceedings. The man appeared not to notice his approach at all, and continued to labor on with his pastime, carrying on a muttered address to the obdurate "bones."

      "Come 'sev,'" he muttered again and again, as he flung the dice on the table with a flick of the fingers.

      But the "seven" would not come up, and at last he raised a pair of keen black eyes to Gordon's face.

      "Cussed things, them durned bones," he said briefly, and went on with his play.

      Gordon smiled.

      "It's like most things. It's luck that tells."

      The

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